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Friday, April 17, 2009

The Friday Five

Here's a picture of the front of Methodist Hospital-Mayo Clinic in downtown Rochester where I will be spending a big chunk of my time over the next few days. (Not as a patient, but as the family member of a patient)

My MIL had surgery last evening, and I thank you all for your thoughts and prayers. She came through beautifully.

So, today is Five things I learned while at the hospital yesterday.

1. Pastor Kevin rocks. Thanks for coming to visit and for your prayer and Scripture reading.

2. My SIL is an amazing woman, tender and tough, funny, fragile, and with a love of Jesus that shines through her every action. When my daughter said "Aunt Linda is the nicest person I know." I heartily agreed. Linda, you rock too.

3. Mayo is a polyglot. We had health care specialists from Africa, Asia, and other places I couldn't even identify. And they were all top-notch. We're blessed to live in the same town as the best health care in the world.

4. Surgical Residents are VERY YOUNG LOOKING and work impossibly long hours. The fellow we talked to late last night after the surgery had been working for at least 16 hrs, and wasn't finished yet for the day. And he would be back before 6 am for morning rounds before starting surgery all over again. I hope he found a bed somewhere to rack out on for a few hours.

5. That connotation means a lot when you're discussing medical devices. They have used three words to decribe the steel apparatus they inserted as part of the orthopedic surgery. It has been called a pin, a rod, and a nail. I have to say, I prefer pin. That seems the least invasive, least painful, and least scary of the three terms. Made me think, as a novelist, about the necessity of getting not just the term right, but the connotation to evoke the feeling in the reader that you're going for.

Thank you for your continued prayers for my MIL and for the family. They lift us up.

Praying for a smooth recovery for your mil and glad you have a supportive team around you. Residents and editors who are the same ages as my children scare me. Yet I remember being a 22 year-old-nurse and holding people's lives in my hands. I had no concept of age then. Something about youth and confidence is a good thing.